Kind of interesting to consider whether I'd feel different about the capitalism competition if I felt like less of a loser. I mean, realistically I'm a WINNER. But imagine being a billionaire: capitalism would have delivered everything you could wish for. And imagine having worked all your life to be a rich businessman. YOU'VE worked hard, why can't that bloke lying in the sleeping bag in the shop front?

I was just pondering why it is that there isn't a left-wing Murdoch equivalent. And I guess it's because a left-winger is much less likely to become successful in business, because they aren't as likely to WANT to be a 'winner'. Mind you, of course, there are philanthropic billionaires. I wish they'd throw their weight behind a media outlet to rival the right-wing press.

I think so much of what is bad in life (hatred for others, racism, a lot of violent crime) is provoked by feelings of powerlessness, of feeling like a 'loser'. And competition is hard-wired into us, as it is into any organism.

but competition in art say, is more benign. usually a case of fuck, i cant beleive they done that i have to find a way to match it, whereas sports like tennis are wars of attrition the goal being to grind another mans will down to iron filings

This is not always the case, I'm sure there plenty of envious, bitter artists out there. I guess it's more pronounced in sports. I read an article yesterday about this girl who is the world' best swimmer, by MILES, and was thinking how shit it must be to be even second best to her, knowing that there's somebody out there who will always be better than you no matter how hard you work at it.

I was just pondering why it is that there isn't a left-wing Murdoch equivalent. And I guess it's because a left-winger is much less likely to become successful in business, because they aren't as likely to WANT to be a 'winner'. Mind you, of course, there are philanthropic billionaires. I wish they'd throw their weight behind a media outlet to rival the right-wing press.

I wonder if a lot of left wing positions are hard to simplify into easy narratives in the same way the right can.

For example austerity is simple to explain because it's analogous to a household 'tightening it's belt'. Talk of fiscal stimulus, zero lower bound interest rates and government debt as collateral are all more complicated to explain. As such you're in a situation where the public believe austerity is necessary, despite it flying in the face of textbook economics.

I guess the most mass-appealing way of explaining left-wing positions would be 'let's take these rich bankers/bastards money'. Which isn't a message most rich people capable of bankrolling a tabloid are going to want to get behind.

Does the Sun e.g. present austerity as 'belt tightening' or as punishing benefits frauds and (benefits claiming) immigrants for their supposed laziness?

I guess the most mass-appealing way of explaining left-wing positions would be 'let's take these rich bankers/bastards money'. Which isn't a message most rich people capable of bankrolling a tabloid are going to want to get behind.

Does the Sun e.g. present austerity as 'belt tightening' or as punishing benefits frauds and (benefits claiming) immigrants for their supposed laziness?

Well Ed Milliband's 50p tax rate didn't seem to garner much populist enthusiasm. I suppose the narrative of "he eats a sandwich funny" is simpler then the idea of progressive taxation. Corbyn doesn't eat bacon sandwiches, so there's hope there.

You may well be right about how the tabloids explained austerity. Cameron presented austerity as belt tightening, so BBC viewers would likely have seen clips of him and others explaining it in those terms.

I was going to say that I don't think fairness has a particularly high value in our society anymore, but then isn't that sort of what The Sun et al are exploiting when they have a go at 'dole scum' and the 'parasites' from overseas?

The thing with the real criminals (or the most damaging to the widest range of people) in our society i.e. wanker-bankers, is that they aren't going to get punished for their loophole larceny, so a sense of hopelessness necessarily attends any railing against them. Whereas if you blame it all on the people at the bottom, you get to feel like they WILL get a kicking.

Arguments about the zero lower bound, for example, are generally grounded in appeals to mathematical models. Solving these models is a purely technical matter. But many people neither understand such models nor accept the validity of them when it comes to organising society and deciding what ends it should be ordered towards; they view these as moral questions.